I’m working on a third-party Mothership pamphlet module and had a great playest last wekk; we’re going to continue the adventure with this group, and I also plan to playtest with another group as well.
The level-zero crew consisted of:
@Volkovy, playing "Dog" Fairbanks, an ex-construction teamster.
@Burrbank playing Lana Zephyr, Marine. Top of their class but new to field work.
@Face_Fisted playing Dent, a vat-grown droid with strange eyes like Riddick.
The introductory text I provided them with, in full:
“You're a group of guns-for-hire who’ve fallen in with a small organized crime group, the Rivo Alto Syndicate. The Syndicate’s bosses and their bodyguards were at the Andromeda Luxury Resort and Spa for some low-risk negotiations yesterday when all communications between the resort and the outside world ceased.
Your job is to go to the Resort, find the Rivo Alto bosses, and get them to safety if necessary. The monetary reward offered by the remaining Syndicate leadership is substantial, and should you happen across any of the legendarily decadent Resort’s stores of wealth, they don’t mind if you grab a few souvenirs. They’ve provided you with a ship- a 55-hull version of the Hunter from the PSG- and fine clothes to blend in at the Resort in addition to your usual loadout gear.
According to your mission briefing, the Resort is the only settlement on a small tropical moon called Calle-8. Its atmosphere is toxic but the Resort is contained within a climate-controlled geode with breathable air. You’ve been given a map based on the Resort’s own promotional materials, and datafiles on the missing Syndicate members so you’ll be able to recognize them.
Randomly roll up your stats, trinket and patch, pick out a class, skills and loadout, and prepare for your arrival on Calle-8, where your mission awaits you….”
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| The map I gave the players. |
The crew approach Calle-8 (somewhat amused along the way by the automated piloting software’s goofy graphics), noticing that oddly enough, no security scans sweep their ship as they enter the semi-permeable geodome around the Resort. From far above they spot patches of red on the white pool deck, and don’t see anybody outside on the ground.
Dent runs some scans, determining that the geodome’s security scanners are down and that the only lifeforms in the area are humans and androids- though in the middle of the resort there’s a tiny but unexplained amount of radiation, although not enough to be harmful. Meanwhile, Lana and Dog prep for their landing; they’ve decided to land at Staffing’s cargo dock in the hopes that they’ll be able to use tools from Security or Admin to track their bosses down.
They land, logged by an automated computer terminal, and Dog scans local comms channels as the crew leaves the ship. He finds two separate encrypted channels-one is Rivo Alto, the other isn't immediately identifiable. Also, it seems that no comms have been sent on any channel since yesterday. Dent fails to hack into the mystery channel and instead alerts its owners of the hacking attempt.
As they all step offboard, they hear a faint, metallic voice from inside a nearby shipping container, big enough to walk into. It calls for help and beeps out an SOS. Everyone’s SMGs at the ready, Dog aims his flashlight into the jumbled shipping container, seeing a humanoid figure behind crates of rare fruits. Asked to identify itself, the figure claims to have been scavenged for parts (having its memory cores taken and its leg disabled), so it has no memory and can’t move. The distrustful crew toss a roll of gauze into the shipping crate, shut it, and move on. civilians. Dent tells it they’ll return, though.
They go towards the Admin entrance to the main utility building but find a group of five tall, poised people wearing white caftans and holding guns standing around the door, not speaking or moving. Before getting close enough to alert them, the crew instead decide to enter Security through the main entrance so they can find their extraction target.
Upon entrance, a side door leads to 'SECURITY' and a main hallway to 'DROID RECHARGE HABS'; Dent quickly scans and determines that the building is full of droids. Footsteps approach from the Security hallway- Lana gets into a diagonal firing position, Dent takes cover with his SMG and Dog hides behind the corner of the hallway with his vibechete ready.
Two more of those tall droids wearing white step out. Their expressions are blank. Lana tells them to put their hands up, although they appear unarmed; the one in front sneers and informs the crew that something called ‘Flagler’, which controls them to some extent and helps humans run the resort, sends its regards and hopes they are enjoying the resort. They claim to pose no threat, suggest Lana and Dog drop their weapons and go relax at the spa, and tell Dent to get back to work and stop hanging around humans.
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| An illustration of the encounter. Credit: https://uncannyspheres.blogspot.com/ |
Dent tells the droids that they’d better put their hands up like Lana said, they don’t, and one pulls out a transmitter. Dog jumps out and chops its arm off. Dent snatches the transmitter and finding that it’s already broadcasting its location to other transmitters all over the Resort, so he smashes it. The unharmed droid retreats down the Security hallway but the injured one starts spouting wellness jargon, suggesting that a back massage would be helpful for such violent, unsettled people.
The crew hear backup approaching from the Habs, so they push past the injured droid towards Security. They come to a locked door with a keycard reader, and peer through the door’s window to see see a large room full of monitors with security feeds- oddly, they seem to be taken from moving cameras at eye-level. As they watch, they see one of the cameras enter a luxurious hotel room. A mass of writhing tumors is inside, oozing blood all over the floor.
Dent suggests that the problem at the Resort is more than just a lack of staff, and although Lana fails to kick the door down, they draw the attention of three armed droids in Security in the process, who open the door to confront the crew. Pressed up against the wall to hide, they manage to shoot one’s arm mostly off as the droids come through the door.
In unison, the three of them say, "Flagler doesn't want it to have to come to this. Guests aren't allowed in this area." The droids ones prepare to attack, but acting fast, Dent shoots another one’s arm off. One hits Dent with a stun baton but he crits on his Body save to avoid paralysis, so instead, it revitalizes him and gives him [+] on his next roll. Continuing their tried-and-true strategy of blasting their arms off, the party manage to fend off the droids, who retreat
further into Security.
Dog watches the screens some more to look for the bosses. He sees that a corpse resembling one of them is slumped over in the Bar but gets stressed out by seeing all those awful tumorous lumps.
Lana decides to hack in and sync the security feeds to their HUD so they can view them at any time. They notice a feed where one of the cameras exits a normal, elegant elevator, and steps out into a glitchy void. Lana looks closer into the security footage and notices that each individual viewpoint is labeled from an origin following the template 'EMPLOYEE #XXX'. They continue flipping through the nightmarish feeds, trying to find the guy in the shipping crate. Meanwhile, Dent searches the records and finds a digital log of guest IDs and their room numbers, but no info as to who each ID refers to. And Dog wants to get back to the ship, fire off a flare to alert any surviving Rivo Alto bosses to get over there quickly, and get out of this creepy place.
And with that, our session ended. We’re going to continue soon. I’ve already learned a lot from this first playtest session that I’ll use to refine my adventure further.
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